The Chocolate War (1974)

This book had its pluses and it had its minuses. It was entertaining. I got through it with relative ease. But I don't think it was anything special. I kind of dislike the message the book sends as well. We all want to believe that the bully never wins in the end, and I realize that that's not always the case, but I don't like that as a message for younger kids. It really drives home an overall hopelessly miserably outlook on bullying. Like why even bother discouraging a bully? He's going to beat you in the end anyway. Just sit there and take. Try not to kill yourself in the meantime. Woe is me.

I can only really praise Cormier's writing style. But I don't know that that really makes up for the rest of the book. ( )

The writing was amazing and very honest in its brutality, but I can never see myself rereading this.

The story is terrible in the fact the outcome encourages bullying and mind games. I understand the author was attempting to bring to light the dangerous power struggle that goes almost unchecked in high schools, but while trying to expose this, he made it appear that not only would this power continue to go unchecked, it would actually be worthwhile to be on the side of those in power.

While I can look at it as a warning about bullying, I'm not sure sixth graders would be able to discern that it's a warning cry, but rather they should make sure not to be friends with Jerry, but rather with Archie.

I haven't read Beyond the Chocolate War, so maybe it gets better. But as it ends, I cannot see this as a book I would ever recommend (although I did think Cormier's writing style was fantastic - hence the two stars). ( )

The abrupt ending was the only off note of this book for me. That aside, Cormier does a brilliant job of tapping into that boys' high school environment - part Lord of the Flies, part A Separate Peace. There are the teachers - the Brothers - none of whom provides a decent role model and more than one of whom is downright menacing (i.e. Brother Leon). There are the Vigils, a secret group of students; Archie, though he isn't the president, is the mastermind who comes up with "Assignments" for other students, and who holds the power. This power is held in check only through the black box, which holds six marbles - five white, one black. If Archie draws the black marble, he must complete the Assignment in place of the student/victim. However, Archie's luck has been good so far, and his confidence in his luck is such that the black box does not provide much of a check on his power at all.

The plot centers around one defiant act - Jerry Renault refuses to take part in the school-wide chocolate sale. After some time it is revealed that his refusal is part of an assignment from the Vigils, but even when they reverse the assignment and order him to begin selling the chocolates, he still refuses - standing up to the Vigils and to the intimidating Brother Leon. Jerry's mother recently died from cancer, and his father works different shifts at a factory and is often unattentive, though not uncaring. Jerry is alone, save for fellow student and football player Roland Goubert, a.k.a. The Goober.

The Goober, however, is a conflict-averse, peace-at-all-costs type, even when that cost is not coming to Jerry's defense, leaving him alone at the mercy of the Vigils, the Brothers, and the student body at large: "The Goober started to step forward in protest. He had only sold twenty-seven boxes, damn it. He had stopped at twenty-seven to show that he was supporting Jerry, even though nobody knew, not even Jerry. And now the whole thing evaporated, and he found himself sinking back into the shadows, as if he could shrivel into invisibility. He didn't want trouble."

As the story draws to its climax, Archie ropes in another student, Emile Janza. He uses psychology to manipulate Janza, using him as an instrument against Jerry: "That's why he blew up. If you want to get under a guy's skin, accuse him of being something he isn't. Otherwise, you're only telling him something he knows." Jerry, in the end, is badly beaten, and though he has maintained his defiance throughout the ordeal - taking inspiration from a poster in his locker that asks, "Do I dare disturb the universe?" - his resistance finally crumbles. He tries to tell the Goober, who has come to his rescue after the fact, "They tell you to do your thing but they don't mean it. They don't want you to do your thing, not unless it happens to be their thing, too. It's a laugh, Goober, a fake. Don't disturb the universe, Goober, no matter what the posters say."

All in all, The Chocolate War presents an extreme picture of the bullying behavior that is now getting more attention in schools. Unlike many young adult novels, there is no happy ending and no indication that life is fair or that the good guys win; instead, you're worried about what further damage the bad guys are going to do when they leave high school and are loosed upon the world. ( )

A page-turner but depressing as all get out. ( )

I'm sorry, but I could barely get through this book. It was assigned to me (and the rest of the class) as part of our Young Adult Literature Course. Maybe I came into the book with bad picture already as the professor showed us the 1988 movie version. The movie was horrible and, to me, the book was no better.

I don't really mind controversial themes in literature at all; but just that the writing style put me off. ( )